Whisky Bottles
by Kate Hodges
Summary: John, Claire, Kerry, Don and a bottle of whisky. Trouble is bound to follow.


_**Spoilers:** Slight references to Room Service, but nothing major._

_**Disclaimer:** The Bill, and its characters don't belong to me. They never have and never will. I'm just playing with them for a bit. Can I please have John and Claire? They're not in the show anymore after all._

_**Author's Notes:** All comments, questions and complaints in a review please. Pretty please?_

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**- Whisky Bottles -**

John, Kerry, Duncan, Don and myself are all sitting in John's apartment, where we decided to meet up after a drawn out, difficult case. The case, about a murdered schoolgirl, affected us all pretty badly, and so to unwind, we decided to get together with a few bottles of whisky, to relax.

I'm slumped across the sofa leaning part way on John's lap; Duncan and Kerry are snuggling into the chair opposite us and Don is resting on the floor. It seems from the looks of things that Kerry and Duncan have become quite friendly in recent months.

We are all quite drunk by now, having already gone through one bottle between us, and are well into the second one. "Ever played spin the bottle?" Kerry asks us all.

"Aren't we a little old for that," I ask.

"Nah," comments Don, "you're never too old for spin the bottle, or truth or dare Claire."

"In that case," interrupts John, "Truth or Dare Don?"

"Truth please," Don Beech answers, joining in on the game.

"Is it true that you've got a secret girlfriend and if it is, who is it?"

"It's true but it's no one you know," he answers mysteriously.

"Truth or Dare Jonathan," he returns the question.

"It's gonna have to be truth Don, I don't think I trust your dares just yet."

"Fair enough, you won't like the truth's either after this but, is it true that you fancy Claire here?" he asks, placing a hand on my arm.

"Don," I admonish him, "that's not fair."

"Sure it is, so Jonathan, what's your answer gonna be."

"We both know the answer to that one already, but I'm not about to cause a fight by saying so out loud," John answers, with a hint of mystery lacing his words.

Don accidentally found out about our secret relationship the other week when we got caught on some CCTV tapes at the London Dock Hotel. We have told him that we want to keep quiet about it for now, but that hasn't stopped him teasing us mercilessly when nobody else is around.

"If you insist," comments Don, "but I don't see what all the secrecy is about myself; office romances happen all the time."

"I suppose your proof of that then Don?" I ask, wondering if I can get him to reveal some more information about himself, maybe even get him to incriminate himself.

"Who me?" he asks, pointing towards himself, "I'm an angel Claire."

"That's not what I've heard," I say, hinting to a much deeper meaning.

"The floors moving," Duncan cuts through our conversation, sounding way to drunk for his own good.

"Who left him with that other bottle?" I ask, being the most sober of all of us.

We all look around the room for the missing bottles of whisky, noticing that there is only a third of the remaining bottle left.

"Nah, it isn't, your just looking at it too hard," Kerry giggles drunkenly.

"You all sound a little too drunk to me," I comment, realising this situation is getting out of hand, and fast.

I only agreed to it, because I though Don may be careless enough to mention something pertaining to his suspected corruption after he's had a bit to drink, it seems he can hold his drink alot better than I thought.

"I'm perfectly fine Claire," John says to me, wrapping an arm around me, to pull me back to his lap, "it's just Duncan and Kerry over there we need to worry about, and I thought the Scots were supposed to be good at holding their liqueur."

"Not after two full bottles of Scotch their not. No one can still be sober after that," I say, "I don't think either one of them is in any state to drive home tonight."

"You know we can still hear you right?" Kerry comments, hiccupping.

"The sofa pulls out," John states without thought, "They can stay here for tonight."

Together, me, John and Don pull the sofa out to form a bed, then, after giving me instructions on where to find clean sheets and covers, Don and John move Duncan and Kerry onto the sofa. They instinctively curl up against one another and are asleep within ten minutes.

"Now what?" John questions.

"Dunno," I mumble reluctant to go home, I've become quite accustomed to spending the night here in John's flat, but with the others around it's awkward.

"Well, you two can do whatever you want," slurs Don draining the last bottle of whisky, "I'm just gonna curl up here on the floor and go to sleep," with that said, he promptly passes out in the middle of the living room floor.

"C'mon," John says to me almost immediately pulling me up from where i'm now sitting on the floor.

"Where we going?" I ask following him down the long narrow hallway.

"Well I dunno about you, but I don't exactly feel like spending the night on the floor," he says, pulling me to him for a lingering kiss.

"We can't," I mumble as he pushes open the door in front of us and pulls me into his bedroom.

"Why not?" John asks me, "If we're quiet they'll never know."

I let out an indecisive sigh, before following him into the room and carefully shutting the door behind us. Almost immediately he pulls me to him for a kiss, which I respond to eagerly, pulling myself as close to his chest as I can possibly get. He takes slow steps backwards, one, two, three, before we collapse on the bed in a jumbled heap, never once breaking our kiss.

"Besides," John says to reassure me, "If for some reason they do find out, we can just blame it on the alcohol, it's the oldest trick in the book."

"Ok," I mumble finally giving in, people finding out is a small price to pay for what we have right now, I think, pulling him back to me for another kiss.

Slowly and carefully we undress and fall into bed, not giving a second thought to the others who are sleeping just down the hall.

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The End


End file.
